by E. M. Moore
Travis’s eyes widened and then he searched the crowd for where she went.
“Shit,” Randy cursed, pushing me toward Liam as he followed Travis into the crowd. “Move out of the way. Move it!”
The crowd dispersed for them quicker than I’d seen anything like it. I felt the earth shake under my feet and then a blood-curdling scream. Liam, Gabe, and I moved to follow. Up ahead, Randy has Jennie in a vice grip while Travis lifted Jennie’s sleeve to see the familiar there. It bulged out of her skin. The witches that gathered around for the spectacle gasped. Most of them had never—and would never again—see anything like this.
We ran up to them, just steps away from a stone ship slip. The superiors ran up in front, inspecting Jennie like they were doctors with a patient who had a terrible skin disease.
An eerie laugh broke through the commotion. It bounced around the area again like the demon was using a megaphone to spread his hate far and wide. We looked all over until someone shouted, “the Mast.”
I looked up, and sure enough, Jax was hanging off the mast of Friendship. “I see you’ve found my pet.” Even though he was fifty yards away, his voice was as clear as day, sinking into my pores and twisting my stomach. “I’d hoped that she’d throw you for a little while, but your Norah is something else.”
“You have no idea,” I said, glaring up at him.
If he hurt Jennie, and in essence, tearing Travis apart again, I was going to kill him myself.
21
Jax smirked. There was no hiding his eyes now. They were glazed over in black like the shiniest onyx I’d ever seen. In his eyes were the bottomless evil thoughts he harbored. To look at him was to feel a negative thought take hold of your mind and start to grow. It was a good thing I had those I loved surrounding me or I just might forget what I was doing here.
The crowd got restless, and he laughed again, this time darker than the previous.
He let go of the mast, but instead of falling onto the deck of the Friendship in a crumpled heap, he floated. He glided through the air and settled himself fifteen feet above the ocean, just a step beyond the grassy square that led there. “Since that fun is gone, I suppose I’ll take my pet back.”
Jennie screamed. The snake bulged out of her skin again like it was truly a real-life snake that wanted to break through her skin. Her head rolled back as a sob raked her. Randy held on to her tighter and her body writhed as the snake poked and stretched her skin.
“Yes, it can be quite painful,” Jax said.
Liam moved forward. He’d known what that felt like.
The snake finally poked its head out, its tongue darting out in a quick hiss as he slithered out. He grew and grew until the last of his body emerged from Jennie and she slumped to the grass. Travis followed her.
The crowd again parted as the snake slithered past. Everyone gave it a wide berth. Its head swung from side to side, hissing at anyone who looked at him.
“Don’t let it get to the demon,” I shouted.
Familiars were a demon’s pet, right? It would make sense that part of the demon’s powers lived inside the familiar, so if we could kill the familiar…
Randy ran forward. He dove, holding out his arms so he could capture it, but Jax held his hand out. The snake reared back, ready to make the jump into Jax’s palm even though he was yards and yards away.
Liam shot his palm out, sending a ball of fire his way. It missed and landed on the grass where a bonfire built. The crowd gasped, leering at Liam. He didn’t even notice. He kept doing it and doing it, each of the fireballs missing as the snake soared through the air.
Gabe grunted. To my left, a huge burst of blue light lit the sky. The ocean pulled up from the wharf. It moved out toward the snake in a concentrated blast, hitting him in the air. The wave of water fell onto the grass. We waited for it to recede back, and sure enough, the snake was there, slithering again toward Jax.
Randy threw a blast of green magic in front of the serpent, making him change direction. The gap in the earth opened, spreading over the entire wharf. The snake looked back and hissed.
Jax sighed. “Oh, you lot are so tedious.”
Gabe, again, brought up a wave of ocean from just under Jax and sent a tidal wave toward the snake. It hit him full force. It got caught up in the wave, tumbling end over end. The wave splashed up over witches’ knees and kept going. It ran over my sneakers, but with it came the snake.
The superiors burst through the edge of the crowd and threw up an Akashic cell.
“It won’t hold,” Travis and I yelled at the same time.
Jax laughed maniacally again. “Oh, old people. They’re so cute.”
He threw his hand out again, summoning the familiar to him, but this time, Randy jumped on it, wrestling with it until he pinned it down. Walter and his coven moved forward. As it had in the barn, the magic in the area intensified. It far escalated any of the power I felt the last time we’d faced off with the demon and its familiar in the barn. This time, there were witches upon witches there, gathering with us to lend us their magic, to lend us their help and power and hope.
The magic whipped out of Walter, who stood at the front of his coven. My heart surged in my throat. If their aim was just a little off, they’d hit Randy and if they hit Randy, there was no doubt in my mind that he’d be dead. No one could survive that amount of magic.
Randy screamed. The sound reached a fever pitch as the combined magic from the superiors burned bright, brighter, brightest, until it just fizzled out.
Jax howled. I pushed past the crowd and saw Randy’s arms folded over nothing. The serpent familiar had just disappeared. I threw myself at Randy, tackling him back into the ground when I saw that he was okay. He held me tight, his chest heaving against mine. “Are you hurt?”
He shook his head, his hand grasping me over and over again as if he couldn’t get me close enough. “I can love, Norah. I can.”
It took me a second to understand what he was referring to. I shook my head when I knew he was worried about what Jennie had said when the serpent familiar was attached to her. “You of all people can love the most because you understand what it’s like to live life without it.”
Damn. That sounded like a Granny thing to say.
It was true though. Love, just like anything else, could be taken for granted. Those who had all of it and then some didn’t understand living with scarcity and emptiness. They would only learn if it got taken away, which I would never wish on anybody. Randy, though, he understood what it was like to live without it, which meant he truly understood the power of it. Just like me.
Jax roared. Randy’s eyes widened, and he scrambled to his feet, taking me with him. Screams rose up from the crowd. Jax dropped from the sky and landed at the very edge of the wharf before barreling forward. The crowd moved to the outskirts as Randy and I moved to the center. Gabe, Liam, Travis, and the superiors were already there. “You take something more from me?” he screeched.
His face pulled back into an angry snarl and for a moment, it wasn’t Jax’s outward appearance anymore. The true demon showed through into the stuff nightmares were made of. Gaping holes where the eyes should be. Sinewy, rotten muscle stretched over a skull with jagged-like teeth. Before I knew it, it was back to Jax, and I was caught thinking whether I’d just imagined it or not.
“It’s not him. It’s not him,” Travis said, chanting the words to himself.
“You did this to me!”
It’s not him. It’s not him.
Randy growled and moved forward. He threw his green magic at the earth, trying to make Jax trip, but it didn’t work. Anger surged to the surface after each failure until he was breathing out his nose like a raging bull. The demon stopped in front of him, its face pulled back into a sneer. He reached out and poked Randy, and Randy fell to the ground in agony, his hand covering the spot where they touched.
Water and fire came at Jax all at once, each of them canceling the other out. Travis still spoke to himself.
Chaos ensued around us. When Jax walked by people, they either fainted or pure hatred consumed their eyes. He didn’t turn them into hateful beings, he used their hatred for him against them, consuming them with it.
He walked up to me, his head cocked to the side. “I still haven’t figured out what makes you so special.”
This woke Travis up. His hands glowed red and a fierce wind whipped up out of nowhere. Witches screamed as some got knocked off their feet. Jax leaned into it, his face still a smirk. His hatred blinded me. It poked at my exterior until it was all I could see.
Behind him, the world went fuzzy. Hair tracked across my face and I planted my feet so I could stay upright, but the hate he had for everything was like a blow to the gut. My spirit magic curdled inside me, hiding away like a tortured puppy. It didn’t want to come out with all that negativity.
“Feel the love, Norah Girl. The love.”
I heard her beside me, as if she was speaking into my ear. When I looked that way, I saw her again just as plain as day as if her body was truly here. “You never,” she stressed. “Never combat hate with more hate. You always fight it with love. Reach deep down. Feel it inside you.” Her words made hope spark again. It was a small ignition, a little flame that started in my heart and grew outward like tentacles trying to take over my body, but the demon kept pushing back. “Fight it! Use it!” Granny said. Her Creole accent took over, reminding me of the life she’d given me. I would’ve been lost without her. Parents who died way too young and a grandmother who took in a snotty kid who hated her ancestry. But Granny. She’d made it all worth it.
As if she could hear my thoughts, Granny said, “You were my greatest achievement, Norah Girl. Not one ounce of magic or voodoo could’ve made up for you. Not one ounce.”
Tears sprang to my eyes and tumbled over. The wind froze them on my cheeks at the reminder of what I meant to other people. I let that hope, that love, fill me. His darkness was reaching in, but the bright white stained purple was fighting against it.
He pushed, and I pushed.
“Feel it!” Granny urged.
My hand reached out. It linked with Travis’s, and I let my love for him flow into him. I let every last thought I’d ever had about him seep from my hand into his until he glowed too.
Would it sound corny to yell out, ‘Think good thoughts’? Well, fuck it.
Repeating Granny, I said, “Love fights hate! Let it fill you!”
His shadows receded, and I could see more of the witches who were still there. Still intent. The hatred I’d seen in their eyes earlier pulled back, and little by little, I saw the shift in them. I saw how just the tiniest bit of light could shine through and make a world of difference.
Gabe grabbed my other hand. He glowed blue. His blue and my purple made the prettiest violet that beamed through the air. The light sparked love inside others as they watched. Randy crawled toward us, his face still a mask of pain. Liam helped drag him until they were at my feet. Randy reached out a hand to touch my leg. His mouth dropped, and his eyes rounded into two large spheres, his dark brown eyes almost gold as he stared up at me.
Liam stood, backing up into Gabe and I until he put his arms around both of us. A surge of love shot through us all. Sweet, sweet, Liam. He had enough love for all of us.
Jax roared. Travis still held his forward momentum with the wind, but little by little he was being pushed back further.
In my head, I started to say the spell that would rid a demon. The one Red had found for us in the Reid’s secret spell book room. I looked out, gazing at the onlookers. Sure enough, Ren was right there. He glowed, too. Seeing love and compassion come from a guy like that made my own bubble up to the surface. He held Dean Reid’s hand, and Mr. Reid, and the youngest Reid was there too. Next to them was Murphy & Anna. Anna’s hair wild about her face, but I already knew the two of them held love for one another. That much was evident when Murphy came to us when Anna was sick. And even next to them, there were a few of the sorority girls I’d met my first week here when we battled Dupre. Travis’s friend that I’d gotten so jealous of, but none of that mattered.
We were all together. All fighting for one thing.
“You’re doing it, Norah Girl.”
Granny’s voice fell over me like a security blanket. It was as if her own arms came around me, pushing me even that much over the love train that I could almost burst with it.
Jax cried out. I looked over to lock eyes with him. His fire was already dying inside.
My lips moved. My coven started to join me until Jax rescinded into himself.
Hate can’t live where there is love. And that was all a demon was, the personification of hate, and we only gave it strength when we paid attention to the hate inside us. Not anymore.
He shriveled, his face morphing and shrinking until his whole body was just a ball of black that spun like mad until it was just a speck. And then it was nothing.
Travis pulled back on his wind and collectively, we all fell forward with a sigh of relief.
The demon was gone. It was dead.
Travis slipped to his knees and the rest of us joined Randy and him there, forming a circle where it was just the five of us. “You guys were right,” Travis said, holding back tears. “The demon had consumed him. If it hadn’t, at least Jax’s body would’ve been left.”
I swallowed, and we all inched closer until Randy hissed in a breath.
Liam pulled back. “Norah, can you help him?”
Randy immediately raised his hand. “No. We’ve already used enough magic.”
Around us, cheers went up. I pulled back out of our circle and looked around. Witches kissed other witches. They hugged, they smiled. In general, the love and glory were still all around. “I don’t think it was just us,” I said.
22
Travis hugged his sister, and she stepped back, waving at all of us in the process.
We watched as she bound down the steps and out to the street to get her taxi. She was the last of our house guests to leave.
The superiors had left right away, doing whatever it was they did after a coven took out a demon. Oh, that was right. We were the first coven to do that. Thank goodness they’d been smart enough to reinstate us as the Order in Salem. They’d really have a mess on their hands if they didn’t.
Randy had a bandage over his chest where he’d always have a black mark from where pure evil had touched him. The doctors were stymied by what was plaguing him, but we weren’t. I ended up using magic on him anyway, at his protest, but that wasn’t all I did. I made sure he knew every day since then how much I loved him. That was the only way I knew how to get that black mark to fade. Maybe one day it would just be a memory.
Murphy and Anna had gone back to their lives in Boston. Same with the Reid’s. Liam and Dean had exchanged numbers, but to my knowledge they hadn’t called one another yet. Ren, too, had left to go do whatever he was going to do with his life. I had a hard time believing a guy I saw that much light pour from would go back to having his magical whore house, but stranger things had happened.
Randy, Travis, and Gabe sat on the couch and Liam and I piled on top of them, making sure not to jostle Randy too much. It had been like that since the big showdown. If people thought we were strange before, they were going to think it even more now. We couldn’t keep our hands off one another. It wasn’t always sexual, but I still liked that a hell of a lot. I had an inkling that’s why Jennie left so soon. She couldn’t take it here anymore, but hell, what were we supposed to do? She had invited us to Adams, though, and that was a good start in the right direction when it came to Travis’s relationship with his family.
I sighed. I was able to touch them all with at least one part of my body. My arm was thrown over Gabe while I sat on Travis’s lap. My feet touched Randy and Liam’s hand was on my back. I couldn’t think of a better way to live my life than to be with all of them for all the days to come. My heart lifted, clogging my throat. I’d been a real sap lately, which
was something new for me.
Granny poofed into my vision. She smiled down at me. I wasn’t sure what had happened, but it seemed as if she could come to me whenever she wanted now. She didn’t need me to go to sleep to do it. “You’ve made something really special for yourself, Norah,” she said.
I smiled at her. “Because of you.”
Travis stiffened. “Are you talking to her again?”
I nodded, chuckling. None of them really thought it was a good thing Granny could just pop in whenever she wanted now. They looked around even when I was just staring off into space sometimes, and they especially didn’t like the idea of her popping in if we were having sex. They made me promise to tell her those times were off-limits, to which she replied exactly as I would have expected. “Do you think I want to watch you guys play hide the pickle? Tell them to get a grip. They’re not all that.”
Granny winked at me, then disappeared again, leaving her warmth in the aftermath.
This was my life now. My big, beautiful life, and I couldn’t be happier.
“Now about that hot tub at the ocean house,” I said, raising my eyebrows at Liam.
He smirked. “Oh, I didn’t tell you. They put it in yesterday.”
I sat straight up. “Are you kidding?” I stood, a smile overtaking my face. “Last one to the hot tub is a rotten egg!”
We all stood, clamoring toward the apartment door. Travis grabbed the Jeep keys off the kitchen counter and we were off to have this lovely adventure I called a perfect life.
Author Notes
Wow. I can’t believe I’ve written the end to the Order of the Akasha series. Can I just say that I really loved writing/living in Norah’s world? She’s so fierce, independent, loyal, unashamed. She’s basically everything I wish I was.
That’s how I try to write all my female main characters. With Norah, I liked that she was feisty. With Ariana, I love how strong she was. It came across in everything she did. With Lia, the heroine in my new HER ALIEN SCOUTS series, she—like Ariana—has gone through a tragedy. Lia’s in the beginning stages of recovery though. She’s still trying to feel her way out of the darkness, and I admire her for that. Sometimes the hardest things we do are admit that we need to be better, do better, and feel better.